


all of me

by etacanis



Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Break Up, Flashbacks, M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-06
Updated: 2020-02-06
Packaged: 2021-02-28 07:01:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22589845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/etacanis/pseuds/etacanis
Summary: In which Dick pretends that everything is okay.
Relationships: Lewis Nixon/Richard Winters
Comments: 10
Kudos: 58





	all of me

**Author's Note:**

> Oh hey, it's been seven years since I last wrote fanfic!
> 
> This has not been proofread by anyone, or checked for accuracy by me, I just got a little worm in my head and wrote it on my phone on the train and at the gym, so I'm sorry if it's really bad!!
> 
> Inspired entirely by all of me by Billie Holiday.

He should have known; he should have known it wouldn't be as simple as he said it would be.

_ You go home, I go home, you find a girl, I find a girl. Kids, picket fence, a dog - isn't that what war heroes are meant to do? Isn't it? Isn't it? _

The anger in Nix's voice is as fresh in his memory as it ever was. That flash in his eyes, the words spitting off his teeth. He didn't get it, didn't want to get it, wouldn't let Dick explain that it was for the best.

And that had been it - a slamming door and that was it. The war ended, and Nix still wouldn't look him in the eye. Three weeks to get back home, and not a word, not a glance, nothing, except the dull sick feeling roiling in Dick's stomach, clawing its way up his throat. It was like whatever world Nix now occupied, Dick wasn't in it, wasn't even welcome in it.

_ Fuck off, Dick, just fuck off, I thought you were different but you're not, are you? _

He'd sent a postcard from New York, simple, it said wish you were here on the front and Dick hadn't any other words, just signed the back and left it at that. Nothing. He'd sent a letter when he bought the house, let Nix know where he was. Still, nothing. He'd tried, he had, but how do you say  _ I'm wrong, I'm sorry, please, I didn't want  _ **_this,_ ** _ Nix, I l- _

He tries to move on. Hears through the gossipping gang of school girls that is Easy that Nix has a girl now, a pretty thing,  _ red hair, just like you, Dick, you got a sister in Jersey?  _ He takes a girl out to the movies, takes another for dinner, says all the right things but it ain't the right thing and he knows it, and he lets them down gently and rattles around the empty house. There's no picket fence, but maybe a dog is just the thing?

* * *

He can't sleep for dreaming.

_ Nix's hand around his cock, his mirrored around Nix's, desperately pulling each other off, this is just buddies helping buddies, the silence around them, desperate breaths catching in their throats, this is nothing, nothing at all, just a bit of relaxation, it's been shit, too much death and too much everything else and this is just a helping hand. Dick had almost choked on his cry as he came, and Nix had smirked at him, wiped his hands on his trousers and wiped them again with mud,  _ **_that'll do_ ** _. _

_ The second time - okay, maybe it was something more, not just buddies being buddies. Curled up in a fox hole, panting silent breaths into each other, and Nix had whispered his name over and over  _ **_Dick, God, yes, Dick, like that._ ** _ As quiet as they could be, and still too loud, but it was worth it, so worth it. _

_ He dreams about the first time they kissed;  _ **_it_ ** _ had been going on for longer than either of them cared to think about, but a line had been drawn and intimacy was too far over that line. Until, of course, the line didn't matter any more. It had been one of those days, a close call, more loss, more blood, and Dick just couldn't, couldn't not, and he'd pressed Nix against a wall and kissed him, kissed him with everything he had. Nix had given it just as good, had grabbed at Dick and bitten at his lip, moaned into Dick's mouth and - they could have stayed like that, forever, but footsteps got closer and they couldn't, but oh, there were more kisses, the lines well and truly invaded because - well, they were paratroopers after all, and what did enemy lines matter? _

* * *

It's been six months, and Dick has a Labrador now, and work is mind numbing but at least nobody is dying, and at least the dog is happy to see him when he comes home.

He sees his parents on Sundays, attends church and goes for dinner, and lets his mom tell him he needs to find a nice lady, what about Ruth? And he nods and he agrees and they both know he'll never take Ruth out, and his mom will murmur to her sister that  _ she just doesn't know what's wrong with her boy, and that blasted war, and she just worries so much. _ Dick knows damn well what's wrong with her boy, but he can't say it, because no mom wants to hear that Ruthy, sweet Sunday school teacher Ruthy, just isn't as good as an alcoholic, stupidly rich, ex-soldier from New Jersey. Dick doesn't want to hear it or think it, and yet when he's pulling himself off late at night in the silence of his empty house, it's the memory of Nix sucking him dry that gets him through it, no matter how hard he tries to avoid it.

Three times a week, he runs. Sets out the front door and goes, and goes, and goes until his mind is clear and his legs are lead and his chest is on fire. Then he turns back around and he heads home, it's never enough, the thoughts come straight back and the burn doesn't last, so he just keeps going. Each run takes him further, but he's filling out again, losing that starved look he'd gained in Europe. He could take Currahee back to back, but then he thinks about Nix running ahead of him, smirking the whole way.

On Tuesdays and Thursdays, the diner on Main street runs a GI special, and the food is good, better than anything he had for a long time, and they ask just the right amount of questions before they leave him to his meal. He stays an appropriate amount of time, let's the noise of chatter drown out the rioting thoughts in his brain, and pointedly doesn't let the Nix in his mind make comments on the girls, or joke about how all the coffee needs is a shot of whisky.

It's through this, through mind numbing predictable routine that he keeps his sanity, and the what ifs of it all away.

* * *

It's eight months, and Dick comes home from work to a postcard in the mailbox. The New York skyline, wish you were here scrawled beneath it, the twin to the one he sent nearly a year ago. Identical, except for the back. It's blank just the same, save for a chicken scratch that approximates to Nix. He'd recognise that handwriting anywhere, and his heart thuds in his chest. He can't allow himself to hope, but there's a flutter in his stomach that's something like it, a sweet taste in his mouth after so long of the bitterness of regret.

The what ifs come in thick and fast, and Rudy is hopping round his feet all dopey grin, ready to go out, and it's a Tuesday but damn - his routine is fading fast because maybe, just maybe, maybe Nix has forgiven him.

_ It was cold, bitterly cold, and Nix had his hands cupped around Dick's. Ostensibly, it's for warmth, so they can actually hold their rifles if a German walks across their lines, but they'd said that an hour ago, and their hands are warm, but it's nice, and as normal as it can be. He's been murmuring away, stories about Yale and about this and that and all Dick can think is wouldn't this be nice, this, forever-  _ And that, looking back, is when the seed of doubt crept it, and why Dick ruined it all.

* * *

It's been nine months, and there's been nothing since that postcard. The twitch of hope has fizzled out, and the bitter taste of regret is back, and Dick is running harder and faster and further.

His feet pound the pavement, his breath comes out in staccato bursts, hisses in through his teeth and then out, out, out,  _ forget it all, Dick.  _ He rounds the corner of his block, slows his pace and counts 1, 2, 3,  _ who the hell are we, _ and for a moment, the memory of Currahee is so strong that when he looks up, and Nix is there, lounging against his front door like that's exactly where he's meant to be.

Dick stops, and stares, and there's  _ that _ smirk.

"Hi, Dick."


End file.
